The present invention relates generally to a lacrosse goalie glove and, more particularly, to a lacrosse goalie glove that provides an increased blocking area and thus allows for improved deflection of a lacrosse ball.
In contact sports, such as lacrosse or hockey, where sticks are essential elements of the game, a player""s hands and wrists are especially vulnerable to injury when being checked by another player""s stick. For this reason, players typically utilize padded gloves to protect their hands, wrists and lower forearms during play. The areas of a player""s hand that are particularly susceptible to injury are those areas where the glove flexes, because at those locations, the protective padding is typically constructed such that it can bend or flex with a player""s joint. However, such bending or flexing, such as at the wrist or knuckle area, can leave the player""s joint exposed due to the bending away of the protective padding and, therefore, susceptible to injury.
Lacrosse gloves are well known for defenders and attack player. However, while lacrosse goalies have certain specialized equipment that satisfies the need of their position, lacrosse goalies typically wear substantially the same gloves as the defenders and forwards. The primary differences between the protective gloves worn by goalies and those worn by the other players on the field is that the lacrosse goalie gloves have a harder thumb portion and are therefore a little less flexible.
It is known, that a lacrosse goalie has different movements and responsibilities as compared to defenders or attack players. A lacrosse goalie in their role as defender of a lacrosse goal, has two main purposes, one is to prevent an incoming lacrosse ball from entering the goal by catching and controlling it, and two, to deflect an incoming ball that is not caught and prevent it from entering the goal. It would therefore be desirable to provide improvements to lacrosse goalie gloves that can increase the goalie""s ability to successfully deflect the incoming lacrosse balls.
It is therefore an advantage of the present invention to provide a lacrosse goalie glove that is configured to have a wider deflection area than current lacrosse gloves thereby assisting a lacrosse goaltender in the deflection of lacrosse balls away from a goal.
It is a further advantage of the present invention to provide a lacrosse goalie glove that allows for increased hand flexibility.
It is another advantage of the present invention to provide a lacrosse goalie glove with increased surface area as compared to current gloves in order to improve the ability to block a lacrosse ball.
Accordingly, in accordance with the above and the other advantages of the present invention, a lacrosse goalie glove is provided. The lacrosse goalie glove has a cuff portion for engaging at least a portion of a wearer""s forearm. The cuff portion is coupled to a hand portion. The hand portion has a palm portion, an opposing backside portion, an inner side portion, and an outer side portion. The hand portion has a plurality of finger portions secured to and extending therefrom for receipt of a wearer""s fingers. The hand portion has a thumb portion secured to and extending therefrom. The hand portion has a flange portion extending from the outer side portion thereof.
These and other features and advantages of the present invention will become apparent from the following description of the invention, when viewed in accordance with the accompanying drawings and appended claims.